Extenuating Circumstances
by AelinGreywaren
Summary: There's an unwritten rule that when a child loses a parent, you let them off the hook. And so that's exactly what Clarke Griffin does. She slips off the hook, and the world lets her. Everyone that is except the one person she never planned to remember. The one who challenges her, who infuriates her, and the one who may just be the lifeline that brings her back to the surface.


**A/N :** This fic is rated M for some adult content.

I also want to add a **trigger warning** for any readers dealing with **grief** or **depression** , as this story will primarily centre around those themes.

* * *

Chapter 1

 _"The World is a stage, but the play is badly cast."_ \- Oscar Wilde

She stood outside the window of her father's study and watched the guests clad in black and donning their very best sympathetic expressions shuffle around the garden below like rehearsed players in some kind of a melodrama.

The room was empty, any traces that it had ever been inhabited removed spare for the abandoned bookshelf to Clarke's far left.

She felt her throat tighten.

 _How was it possible for a room so empty, to feel so full?_

She shut her eyes in a weak attempt to stifle the familiar sting of tears waiting to be shed. You'd think that she'd be all cried out by now, but her tear ducts failed her just like she'd failed her father 72 hours earlier.

Behind closed lids Clarke could see it all - this room as it once was. The mahogany bookshelf once stuffed with volumes on volumes of titles, books old and new, millions of pages that had stood patiently waiting to be read.

They were gone now, packed away in neat brown boxes marked "to donate".

She saw the modest desk, covered to the brim in papers and photographs, that had faced the window always looking out into the ostentations grounds below. Her father had insisted on keeping it without curtains.

"Why hide a view like this?" he'd say with arms outstretched and a smile as bright as the morning sunlight that streamed in through the panes and blinded them all.

The strain in her throat tightened even further and Clarke forced open her eyes, unable to face even the most harmless and inconsequential of memories any longer.

Though the sun lay hidden behind the grey expanse of an October Connecticut sky, she felt herself blinded all the same, by something differently entirely.

* * *

Noise, that's all she heard: a cacophony of unintelligible sounds that never seem to make it past her ears. She smiled, nodded, and said the lines expected from her.

 _I'm sorry for your loss._

Thank you.

 _I'm sorry for your loss._

Thank you.

 _I'm sorry for your loss._

Why do people call it a loss anyway?

 _I'm sorry for your loss._

Loss implies there's something to be found.

 _I'm sorry for your loss._

 _I'm sorry for your loss._

 _I'm sorry._

.

Me too.

* * *

She lost track of the number of arms that reached out to touch her. There were somber husbands - friends from work that placed a sympathetic hand on her shoulder while their wives, sobbing and emotional, wrapped her up in a suffocating embrace.

 _Let go_ , she thought, _just let me go_.

"Sarah," she heard a man who'd she'd never met before say, "Let the girl breathe."

She managed to flash him the same grateful smile she'd been using all afternoon, almost meaning it this time.

"I'm sorry," the sniffling Sarah said while relinquishing Clarke from her grip, "It's just so tragic. I just really can't believe it. Your father was such a great man, giving Bobby a job and all that. I just can't believe that he's gone, just like that."

She stared at her with eyes that seemed to be begging Clarke for an answer. Staring at her like she was the one who needed consoling.

Luckily she was spared from having to answer because in a moment an all too familiar hand came to rest softly on her shoulder.

"Neither can we. Thank you so much for coming Bobby," Abby Griffin said as she reached out to shake his hand with the one that wasn't on Clarke's shoulder.

"I know Jake would have appreciated it, he always spoke so fondly of you."

The man, Bobby, smiled like it was the most life affirming thing he'd ever heard. Her mother had that way with people, always making them feel special, wanted, like they were important.

"We're very sorry for your loss Abby," he supplied, repeating the same words they'd heard all afternoon.

She smiled graciously, and unlike Clarke's, hers managed to pass for convincing.

"Thank you both, we very much appreciate it." And with a final squeeze of a hand, they were gone, and Clarke was alone with her mother.

"You ok sweetie?"

No, she thought. But she knew better than to share as much.

Instead she settled for asking, "Why did you tell that man that dad talked about him? He's never even mentioned that guy before."

 _He'd_ , she corrected herself afterwards. She ought to familiarize herself with past tense.

Her mom sighed, removing her hand from her shoulder and bringing it up to caress her cheek, placing a stray strand of Clarke's hair back behind her ear where it belonged.

"Because Clarke", her mother explained with the faintest hint of exhaustion to be found in her voice, "Sometimes it's better just to tell people what they want to hear."

 _Better or easier?_ Clarke tightened her lips. Of course that's what she'd say. Who needs the truth when you can just feed lies instead? She wondered how many times her mother had used this particular social maneuver on her. Maybe she didn't even want to know.

"Clarke," her mother paused, noticing her distance, "is everything ok?"

She met her mother's eyes, taking note of the lines around them and of the dark circles hidden behind layers of concealer. Concealing: the Griffin's were masters at concealing. But behind the makeup you could see the exhaustion, the glassy film that stretched over her eyes was the only sign betraying that inside: I'm broken.

Clarke stretched her lips up into a smile: small, but warm. Not big enough to be construed as fake.

"I'm fine Mom, really." She leaned up on her toes and gave her mother a hug for good measure.

She was immediately squeezed back.

"I'm so proud of you honey. You're being so strong through all of this. I know your dad would have been proud of you."

That couldn't have been farther from the truth. _No_ , she thought, _he wouldn't._

But Abby Griffin was right; the lie was easier to accept... it was what she wanted to hear.

"You know," her mom continued in a lighter tone than before, "Dr. Kane is here."

Clarke furrowed her brows. Dr. Kane was her mom's boss, or colleague she should say. They were equal in rank since her mom's promotion to Head of Cardiovascular Surgery.

But why did his presence have to concern her?

"And why are you telling me this?" she questioned.

"Well," Abby replied sweetly, "I just think it'd be a good chance for you to talk to him. Let him get to know you better, on a more personal level. Try to get the ball rolling for that summer internship."

And there it was. She should have known.

"Mom I really don't think I'm up to thinking about that right now."

Abby smiled. If Clarke didn't know her better she'd be inspired. Look at this woman, so brave and so strong; able to put up a smile after facing such a tragedy, always seeing the light.

But she was her daughter and she knew her mother's smiles and this one never reached her eyes. It stopped before it could be genuine. Convincing, Clarke thought, but still not real. It was like she was just acting out the motions.

But that's what they were all doing here wasn't it? Acting out the motions.

"Clarke," she said in a tone that implied both " _I want what's best for you_ " and " _You're going to do what I say whether you like it or not."_

"This is an important opportunity for you, we're talking about your future here. You need to remember what's at stake."

An education, a career, a livelihood : that's what's at stake.

Funny how on a daily basis those are the stakes we worry about, but never _a life_.

It was clear to her that this was not an argument to be won, and despite everything she still didn't want her mother to feel that this was something she'd forced her into.

Even though the internship hadn't been her idea. Even though the last thing she wanted to think about right now was being in a hospital.

But that wasn't acceptable.

She had to go through with the motions.

"Fine, I'll go talk to him."

Her mother breathed a sigh of relief, like all the weight that had been building up in that moment was finally lifted off of her shoulders.

"Thank you honey."

Abby reached out to touch her again, but Clarke walked away before she could, unable to look at that shell of a smile any longer.

* * *

 _I need a drink,_ she thought after another hour on her feet. Being dragged from conversation to conversation with no reprieve.

Between the swarms of adults coming to offer advice, Clarke had managed to find a few of her school friends. Everyone seemed to ignore the band of teenagers milling around one of Connecticut's top CEO's funeral. Ironically, they made up about half the people here who had ever spoken to her father and about three quarters of the ones he'd actually liked.

Monty and Jasper had offered her a flask and without even taking a whiff she could have guessed it contained their home brewed moonshine.

She turned it down, shaking her head while thanking them. She needed a drink, something to remove herself from the situation she was in, not something to make her pass out.

And so that's how she'd ended up walking past the staff entrance, yes the Griffin's were _those_ people who had a staff entrance, and into the kitchen bustling with caterers.

In terms of planning the wake and the funeral, Clarke's mother had spent just as much time tweaking the menu as she had picking out a casket.

She slipped past the caterers who were milling around the kitchen. They must have been between courses to just be standing around like that. Or maybe Hartford's best catering service that her mother had pulled so many strings to secure wasn't as flawless an establishment as they advertised themselves to be.

Once she'd reached the cellar door and made sure she was in the clear, Clarke typed in the 4 digit code on the black keypad to the left of the overly dramatic wood and iron door.

Why her father had gone to such lengths to lock up his wine that he rarely drank she'd never understood.

"A connoisseur cannot just keep his wine without protection Clarke," he'd declare in mock seriousness, his smile betraying that it was all in jest.

The memory of his easy smile was more than enough to make her heart ache, and her longing for that drink seemed to increase even more.

She entered the room leaving the door open slightly. She figured if she was caught she could always say she was down here checking something for her mother, bringing her a bottle of her own personal preference rather than the selections she'd chosen for the menu.

Realistically she didn't need to take that extra caution. This was her house after all, and no one would be too fussed over turning a blind eye to the young Griffin's actions. She'd gotten away with little things like that all her life, but still, that cautious voice in the back of her head refused to be silenced.

She stared at the racks fitted against the walls, rows on rows of the best, or at least the most expensive, wines that her family had gotten their hands on.

Not bothering to check the labels she took down three bottles and placed them on the beachwood table that sat in the centre of the room under four small pot lights.

She didn't have a clue as to what she'd picked out, only knowing that it was wine and assumed it most likely wasn't French.

Jake Griffin was a California man, and he often proclaimed he just about bled Napa.

Not bothering to pour herself a glass she simply uncorked the bottle and took a long swig.

Then another.

And another.

And another, allowing the alcohol to rush to her head.

She sat down and leaned against one of the table legs with her open bottle and ignored the fact that if anyone walked through the door they wouldn't recognize golden girl Clarke Griffin as the pathetic mess getting drunk alone on a concrete floor.

* * *

It was about halfway through her first bottle that she heard the previously muffled voices from the kitchen become louder and she found herself tuning in to the conversation taking place just a few feet away from her.

"Blake, pass me a smoke would you?" a male voice said.

A deep voice answered, "Fuck off Miller."

She heard some shuffling and some grunts, and she assumed that a playful punch or two had probably been thrown.

"You suck you know that?" the first voice panted out.

"Just looking out for you brother," the other boy fired out, and something told Clarke that Miller's health was the last of this "Blake's" concerns.

"Oh kiss my ass."

She'd become so distracted that she'd almost forgotten what kind of a precarious situation she was in and let out a snort. Almost.

"Fuck these things depress me," Miller continued.

"It's a funeral Miller," Blake said in a _"what did you expect"_ kind of voice.

From her position she was starting to get a whiff of the cigarette smoke coming from the other room. There was no way they'd be able to cover up a smell like that easily and if her mom found out about it she was going to be seriously pissed. Somehow that realization didn't bother her much.

"I know it's a funeral, dick, but still. All those people dressed in black, sobbing all over the fucking place. Geez it's enough to make a guy want to off himself."

She heard the other boy give a non committal grunt, "Seems more like a spectacle to me."

At that Clarke felt herself pause, not moving an inch, waiting in anticipation for him to go on.

"All of these people walking around, crying on top of each other while holding on to flutes of champagne. God it's so fucking staged. Think about it, there's got to be what, 400 people here? How many of them do you actually think knew this man well enough to give a damn that he's dead."

It felt like every muscle in her body was frozen. She wasn't even sure whether or not she'd even blinked or taken a breath during those last few seconds. This complete total stranger was giving voice to the exact thought that had been running through her mind all day.

But hearing it out in the open like that, blunt and unapologetic, felt like a slap in the face.

 _This is what the truth feels like_ , she thought.

 _It feels real._

She shifted slightly to her left to try and shake out her leg, that had been growing more and more numb since she'd sat down. But she was tipsy and her motions were less than coordinated so instead she succeeded in knocking over the bottle of wine she hadn't even remembered setting down in the first place.

Crap she thought, as it audibly fell over and rolled over the floor. She quickly picked it up before any could spill, and held her breath hoping the fall had gone unnoticed.

"Did you hear that?" one of the boys asked, and her heart was pounding too fast for her to even tell which was which.

"No…"

"Huh."

Then there was silence, and for a moment she thought she was in the clear.

But a second later a tall shadow appeared in the doorway of the cellar. Her previous plan on keeping it open was looking more stupid by the second.

He opened the door wider, standing behind the light so Clarke was barely able to make out his face. She stood up so the two were closer to eye level and noticed that he was just as tall as she'd thought him to be from her ground perspective. Even standing up she still came at more than a head shorter than him.

From this position she could make out more of his features and she found herself face to face with an undeniably attractive man, the lines of his face making him appear harsher and older than a teenage boy. His face was tan and framed by dark curls that brushed down past his brows. The stranger was staring at her with a slight smirk, looking at her like she was some kind of animal on display and he was waiting to see what she would do next.

She frowned, uncomfortable with the way he was staring at her, and narrowed her eyes. She pressed a finger to her lips, letting him know that she didn't want his friend or any of the other people milling around to know she was here.

He raised his brows and looked at her with curiosity.

The silence was interrupted by a voice coming from behind the door.

"What's going on? Anything there?"

The stranger kept his eyes on her, never breaking their gaze. All of a sudden things felt like a challenge, each of them waiting for what the other would do next.

Clarke narrowed her eyes even further and fixed him with a gaze that (or at least she hoped) said, _You don't want to mess with me._ It had always worked on her ex-boyfriend, but instead of shirking in defeat like her ex had, the stranger had a different look in his eye. He didn't look intimidated, no, he looked amused and that was what pissed her off.

He broke their eye contact to look over his shoulder, undoubtedly at the friend he'd been bantering with earlier.

"No, nothing's here. Must have come from upstairs."

At that moment she noticed that he still held a cigarette between the fingers of the hand that wasn't leaning against the doorframe.

"Ok, well we should get back bro, Jamieson's going to be pissed if he finds us slacking off."

He turned his head back slightly so that his eyes bore into Clarke's again, and despite any sound judgement she felt the faintest of shivers run down her spine.

He brought the cigarette back up to his lips and took another long drag.

Clarke had never smoked before. Being a child of a doctor she'd always equated cigarettes with just about the most toxic kind of garbage someone could voluntary put into her body, but somehow in that moment she didn't think she'd mind taking a drag.

"You go ahead," he called back, "I'll be right there."

Miller must have taken this answer without question because a second later she heard the sound of retreating footsteps, and all of a sudden they were alone.

* * *

The stranger stepped into the cellar and for the briefest of seconds Clarke thought that being alone in an enclosed space with a strange man was exactly the kind of situation she'd always been warned against. But somehow the emotion she felt in the pit of her stomach wasn't fear, instead it was curiosity. Anticipation. The kind of nervous excitement that comes with not knowing what was going to happen next.

He stepped further into the room, leaving the door open behind him. In the light she could see him even more clearly and realized that what she'd first assumed was simply tan skin was actually hundreds of freckles dotting every inch of his skin.

His eyes raked her from the bottom up, lingering not only on the parts of her legs visible beneath her knee length black dress, but on the pearls that lay against her collar bone and the diamond studs adorning her ears.

He was the first to break the silence between them, "You lost, _Princess_?", saying Princess in a way that made her feel like the butt of a joke.

She inched backward so the tops of her thighs were pressed against the table to steady herself before responding. She seriously hoped she hadn't reached the point of intoxication where her words began to slur.

"It's hard to get lost in your own house," she fired back.

She saw him raise his brows in recognition as if all of a sudden the pieces were coming together. She expected him to revert to the polite waiter act, giving her his condolences the same way everyone else had that afternoon.

He came up to lean back against the opposite end of the table and she had to tilt her head to the side to face him.

"So this is your shin dig then isn't it?"

If she hadn't recalled his earlier comment about the spectacle she probably would have been offended, but instead she felt her mouth lift up into a small smile - happy to be having a conversation that, for the first time that day didn't feel scripted.

"You know that's the first time I've heard my father's wake referred to as a "shin dig"."

He shrugged, "Well I'm assuming an elaborate 400 person backyard get together is your people's version of a neighborhood bbq."

She almost laughed at how spot on he was. God, when did her life become so predictable?

"Minus the dead body," she quipped back, making a joke for the first time since finding out the news three days earlier. If it hadn't been for the wine she probably wouldn't have bothered, but it felt relaxing somehow - like finally lifting off one of the bricks from the pile that'd been crippling her chest.

He laughed at her inappropriately dark showcase of humor and turned to meet her eyes and not so subtly shifting closer.

"So tell me, what's Clarke Griffin doing down here getting drunk off of," he picked up one of the unopened bottles she'd left on the desk, "Chardonnay."

She wasn't about to give him an explanation. She wasn't going to tell him that being around all those people made her feel more lonely then standing in the middle of her dead father's empty room, or that the inside of her bottom lip felt raw to the touch from biting down on it all day long to stop herself from letting lose the stream of words she really wanted to say.

She didn't tell him any of that, but settled for a half truth. Not a lie, but just enough of an emission to let her off the hook.

"Can you blame me?", she replied.

He smiled wryly, "No... I guess I can't."

"So something's not fair here," she pointed out in an attempt to change the subject.

"Oh, and what's that?"

"You know my name, but I don't know yours."

He smiled in a way that she felt was genuine and stretched out his non cigarette cradling hand. His hands were large and she couldn't help but notice the way her significantly smaller one was engulfed in his. His grip was strong, confident, but soft as well as she found herself dreading the moment when he'd let go.

"I'm Bellamy," he said before squeezing her hand and releasing it.

 _Bellamy Blake_ , she thought to herself how it would feel to let that name roll off her tongue.

"Clarke," she replied, before realizing how stupid and un-smooth that was.

He smirked, "Yeah, I think I know that. So... _Clarke_ , you planning on sharing some of that or are you keeping it all to yourself."

Obviously she'd been planning on keeping it all to herself, but he knew that already, so why was he asking? She decided to play along.

"Well that depends. Same question back at you," she said nodding her head down towards his cigarette.

He raised his brows as if in disbelief, "You're telling me _you_ smoke?"

 _No_ , she thought, her experiences with smoking were limited to her Not So Sweet 16 two years ago when Jasper and Monty had coerced her into trying weed. But she figured the basic principle was the same so she settled for a shrug as if to say _"Yes I'm a badass/idiot who smokes, what about it?_ "

He smiled like it was the most amusing thing he'd ever seen and said, "Well alright then, but you're going to have to let me take some of that grape off your hands first."

"Let me guess, is that your way of looking out for my health?" she challenged.

"You bet it is, Princess."

Instead of handing him a new unopened bottle, Clarke met his gaze, and took a swig of her half empty bottle and handed the rest to him.

"So what am I drinking to?" he asked.

Clarke shrugged, "How about the fact that at the end of this enough food will have gone to waste that could probably feed a small army for a month?"

He laughed, "Now there's there truth. Or how about the fact that the amount of money that went towards all that wasted food could have been enough to _buy_ a small army?"

She smiled, but said nothing and the two returned to a comfortable silence.

"How about," he started more hesitantly than before, "How about this one goes out to your dad?"

She froze and felt her throat tighten, but slowly she managed to nod.

"Cheers," he said and lifted the bottle to his lips, taking a long drink and almost downing the rest of its contents in one fell swoop.

"Your turn," and he handed her the cigarette. She stared at it like it was a foreign object, before bringing it to her lips and doing what she swore she would never do. She took a drag and let the cocktail of toxins and poisons enter her body. She exhaled and let the puff of smoke embrace her. She felt like she was choking; it was awful, and disgusting, and she didn't know why she did it.

Except she did know, and it was the same reason she'd come down here alone for the wine. It was because she wanted an escape, she wanted a distraction, and she wanted to forget. Only she didn't forget because surrounded by that cloud of smoke all she heard in the back of her mind were her mother's warnings, and her father's laugh, and the sounds of a life she would never know again.

She felt a familiar heat begin to sting at her eyes and she wiped at the tear before it had to fall. She could feel Bellamy's eyes on her and she was glad she could just attribute the tears and the stinging to the smoke. She looked down and hadn't noticed that somehow in the process of drinking and smoking they'd gotten significantly closer, and her bare leg was now resting against his black pants.

"You know you could get in some serious trouble for drinking on the job," she pointed out.

He laughed, and they were now close enough that she could feel the rise and fall of his shoulders against her bare arms.

"I could get in trouble for a lot of things Princess, and something tells me you could to."

She turned to look at him, and in the light she noticed that his eyes were a deep dark brown, perfectly matching the curls that almost covered them.

"Well in case you were worried I'd turn out to be a spoiled brat who gets you fired, don't be. Your secret's safe with me."

"Right back at you," he proclaimed with intensity, and for god knows what reason… she believed him.

"So," he said gesturing to the cigarette (now practically reduced to a stub) in her hand, "Seeing as I am technically your employee for the day, is there anything else you want?"

Her eyes drifted down to his lips, and she was struck by a thought, an idea, so completely un Clarke Griffin that even she almost didn't believe what she was about to do.

Maybe it was the wine, or maybe it was the fact that her father was dead. Maybe it was the fact that he was a beautiful boy and she was a broken girl, but in the moment Clarke decided that she was going to be reckless, and impulsive, and daring. She was going to let herself be distracted and she was going to let herself forget.

She leaned in closer, so close that to look into his eyes would have meant going cross eyed so she instead focus her gaze on his lips.

"Just this," she whispered and then she pressed her lips to his and kissed him

* * *

There was no pause and she didn't have to wait a moment for him to react; this was a man who knew what he was doing, one who probably knew exactly that this is where they'd end up the moment he'd stood in that doorway. In a second he was kissing her back fiercely and his arms came around to encircle her waist, pinning them closer together. He'd flipped around so that he was standing in front of her while she remained pinned to the ledge of the table.

She became lost in his mouth, kissing him with a fervent hunger. Hungry for him, hungry for an escape. He tasted like cigarettes, wine, and something sweeter that she couldn't quite identify. His tongue flicked her bottom lip as if asking for entrance and she obliged, letting out an undignified moan as he explored the inside of her mouth. They were still too far apart, she thought, and even though they were impossibly close, she wanted him closer. She traced her hands up his chest, feeling the hard planes of his muscles even through his white dress shirt. She lace her hands around his neck and moved her mouth to trail kisses along his jaw. It was smooth, not one trace of stubble to be found.

She wound her hands into his hair, the curls soft and pliant beneath her fingertips, and she moved her mouth to nibble and tug at the lobe of his ear.

He let out a groan and dug his fingers deeper into her hips. He brought her mouth back to his, nipping at her bottom lip roughly, but not hard enough to leave a bruise.

She was in a haze and barely noticed the fact that suddenly his hands moved from her hips to her ass. He cupped the backs of her thighs, lifting her up so that she was seated on top of her table. She wrapped her legs around his hips, bringing them closer still. She felt a surge of disappointment when his lips left hers, but that was quickly replaced with a wave of pleasure as he trailed his lips down to kiss her neck.

She felt a heat start to rise up in her and she let out a gasp as he continued to trace kisses all the way down to her collarbone, past her pearls, and slipping the straps of her dress off as she went.

She couldn't think straight, she couldn't think of anything past this moment and his lips on her skin. This wasn't her, she never did things like this. In fact this was usually the moment she would always, except for one time, make an excuse to stop.

Almost as if he sensed what she was thinking he brought his face to look up at her.

"Do you want to stop?" he asked, his voice sounding hoarse and laboured like it was hard for him to speak. She felt the same way, but managed to breathe out, "No. Don't stop."

His face broke out into a mischievous grin, "Whatever you say, Princess."

He brought his lips back down to hers. Their movements became more frantic, erratic, as if now they both knew where they were going and were in a rush to get there. She reached her hands down to pull his shirt out from his pants and began undoing the buttons, her hands surprisingly steady considering just how fast her heart was pounding.

He shifted her back further onto the table and began tracing his lips down again. His one hand remained curved around behind her waist, while the other now traced down her side, sending shivers down her spine, and coming to rest against her chest. He pushed her dress slightly down, exposing her violet bra. She couldn't even remember if she'd warn matching panties.

She leaned her head back as his lips moved lower down to the curves of her breasts that bulged out above her bra. She threw her hands back against the table to steady herself and before she knew it her left arm collided with one of the unopened wine bottles, sending it crashing down to the floor.

Within a second the entire scene came into focus and Clarke became painfully aware of the reality of the situation she'd found herself in.

She wasn't some wild, reckless, impulsive girl. She was pathetic, and lonely, and desperate; making out and almost more with a complete stranger in her parent's cellar just to remove herself from the nightmare that her life had suddenly become.

Bellamy stepped back and she looked away from him, pulling her dress back up and returning the straps back to where they belonged. She no longer felt tipsy, and any blissful buzz she'd been experiencing had disappeared the moment the bottle had shattered to the ground. She slid off of the table and fixed her dress, bringing the hem back down to where it'd been before while he buttoned his shirt in silence.

She didn't want to face him, or face what she'd almost just done and so she left him to stare at her back while she surveyed the damage.

The bottle lay shattered on the ground. This one had been a red, and the wine spilt out from the cracked bottle in the middle like blood. She shut her eyes, trying to furiously blink back tears. Because now what she saw behind closed lids was exactly what she'd been trying to forget and that was her father's body sprawled out onto the pavement, lying there like a broken bottle in a pool of his own blood.

The sound of sirens in her mind was replaced with Bellamy's voice cutting through her memory.

"I should get going."

She opened her eyes and rubbed at the wetness surrounding them, no doubt smudging the mascara that rimmed them even further.

She sniffed, but didn't turn back to face him. At this point it'd be ridiculous to even pretend she wasn't crying, but that didn't mean she had to let him see it.

"Fine," she replied, trying to keep her voice cold and steady.

"Well… ok then," and she heard his steps shuffle closer to the door which in her now painfully sober state she couldn't believe they'd left open.

But he hadn't left yet.

"Clarke… are you going to be ok?"

 _No_ , she thought finally admitting to herself, _I don't think I'll ever be ok again_.

"I'm fine."

She heard him sigh, and she hoped that this was the end of it.

"Ok, but just so you know," he paused for a second, "You don't have to be."

And with that he quit the room, and she was finally alone in the wine filled cellar left with only the faintest memory of cigarette smoke.

* * *

A few minutes later, after she'd made a pitiful attempt in cleaning the room up, she went back outside. She'd glanced at her reflection in the hallway mirror and despite some smudged mascara and the redness to her eyes, she didn't think anyone would notice she'd almost had sex on a table 10 ft away from the kitchen.

But there was nothing she could do right now to cover the smoke.

She figured she'd spoken to just about everyone her mother had expected her to and she planned on sneaking quickly into her room. She stood against a tree debating the fastest way to make it back to the main part of the house without drawing too much attention when her cover was blown.

"Clarke!"

And before she could even register who it was, she was wrapped up in a suffocating hug, and surrounded by a familiar embrace.

She shut her eyes and for the first time that day returned the gesture, wrapping her arms around her best friend's neck, breathing him in like he was fresh air.

Wells Jaha had been in love with her once, he'd admitted it before the beginning of their sophomore year. They'd tried dating for a month before realizing they were nothing more than friends, and every day she counted herself lucky that she hadn't lost her best friend to something as trivial as a high school crush.

"Hey Wells," she choked out.

He released her and wrapped one arm around her shoulder, keeping her close. It'd gotten colder since she'd gone inside and she was grateful for his warmth.

"I've been looking for you everywhere. Our flight just landed an hour ago and we raced here from the airport."

Wells was a year older now, a college freshman and he often travelled with his politician father Thelonius. Similar to Clarke, he too was being groomed to take over the family "business".

Sure enough, looking over his shoulder, she spied Senator Thelonius Jaha, who was giving her mother a comforting hug. Maybe the two Griffin women weren't handling this so differently after all.

Wells squeezed her shoulder. He was taller than her so Clarke ended up only reaching the top of his chest. She leaned her head down onto it, wrapping a hand around his waist.

He placed his head on top of hers in a comforting way, the way he'd done since they were children.

"I'm so _so_ sorry Clarke."

Her only response was closing her eyes.

"Are you ok?" he asked.

She opened them and looked around at the scene. She saw the sea of black, and the glasses of champagne. She saw the green grounds, and the curtain less window. And she saw her mother, holding her father's best friend tight, and though she was meters away, Clarke saw the rise and fall of her shoulders wracking with sobs.

 _You don't have to be_ , echoed in her thoughts.

"Clarke?" Wells asked again.

She breathed in and exhaled.

"No," she whispered, "I'm not."

* * *

 **A/N 2:** So what did you guys think? This story is definitely different, and by different I mean darker, than anything I've written in the past. Even though I'm currently in the middle of working on another multi chapter modern day Bellarke AU, I just really felt inspired. I couldn't shake the idea for this story and I figured inspiration only hits ever so often so I might as well make it count (Of course this doesn't mean I'm abandoning that story, but I did want to try my hand at writing something different for a change as well).

Anyways I hope you guys liked the beginning of this story. I pretty much have it all planned out and I think I'm planning on keeping it shorter than Something New, finishing this one at around 10 chapters. That being said I think I'm going to be keeping the chapters for this one pretty long, so my updates may not be as frequent, but I'll try my best to balance the two.

And finally because I hate sounding like a broken record I'm only going to write this once, but I always appreciate reviews of any kind so if you have the time please feel free to leave one throughout the story and share your thoughts and feels with me :) Feedback is what keeps me growing as writers and it always makes my day!

I hope you guys enjoy this one and with all that being said, of course, none of the 100 characters are mine; they belong to Kass Morgan and the CW.


End file.
